


The Moon Grew Old

by GhostCrumpet



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Darcyland, F/M, Fluff, Historical, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, ShieldShock - Freeform, Slow Burn, Smut, Timey-Wimey, WinterShieldShock - Freeform, WinterShock - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-14
Updated: 2016-04-16
Packaged: 2018-06-02 04:58:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6551992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GhostCrumpet/pseuds/GhostCrumpet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darcy Lewis moves to Brooklyn, NY in 1940 shortly after losing her last of her family. Determined to live life to the fullest, she's looking for adventure and love.</p><p>There she meets James Barnes and Steve Rogers, but can she keep from holding her new friends at arms' length? Will she be able to overcome past hurts in order to find love and happiness?</p><p>========</p><p>Canon-divergent! Chapters with explicit content will be tagged in the header notes. New characters and pairings may appear, so check the tags, as I'll be updating them as I write.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I Met A Doll in Manhattan

**Author's Note:**

> Here's my first foray into the magical world of historical-based fic! I worked really hard on figuring out where in Brooklyn they'd live, and the subway lines and such. I hope you like it!

It was a pretty spring day, as far as Brooklyn was concerned, and Darcy hoped the rest of week was going to be looking up, since she’d just had a solid job interview and subsequent offer at the Navy Yard, working directly under the Commandant and his personal staff as a runner and general assistant. It was a relief, all thanks to her late uncle, and she was pretty thrilled to be making over the minimum wage at $20 a week. She waited at the stop for the streetcar, running her hands over the smooth combed cotton of her blue dress, and looked forward to getting home and taking her new boots off. They pinched a little at the toes, and she hadn’t quite broken them in as of yet. Everything these days pinched though. The last few months had been dark, starting with her uncle’s (and last remaining living relative) death in a factory fire, where he’d been a manager and had tried to get everyone out only to succumb to the smoke and flames himself.

It’d left Darcy truly alone, for the first time ever she had no kin to call her own, and only the $455 he’d left her in his will to support herself with along with her own meagre savings from her part-time job. But she didn’t like thinking about it too hard. His last gifts to her were the ability to go where she pleased, getting out of the small town where the largest company made gloves and there was no future for her but to marry the farmer next door. It hadn’t been just the money he’d left, but also a good word put in for her with the Commandant. He’d done that a few weeks before the fire, since Darcy’s mother had been his favourite sister and she’d lived with her uncle since both her parents had gone, and he wanted her to have more of a future than their country town could provide. She’d finished up her secretarial course in her last year of high school, and had worked in the local accounting office every Friday from the summer up until the day of the fire. Unknowing of his old war companion’s passing, the Commandant had written back finally, although Darcy had only received the letter just days after she’d buried her uncle in his Sunday best.

The letter had read, in part:

_I’d be pleased to meet your niece, if she’s anything like you and her father, then I have a position for her here. Send her along, with enough money to get her settled in Brooklyn, and we’ll see about getting her started at the Yard._

_Yours,_

_Commandant Breville_

So with her uncle making his peace at the pearly gates, his little house they’d rented clean from top to bottom with furniture and knick-knacks sold, and her carpet bag packed up with the three dresses she owned, she’d made her way to New York. The first week had been hard, what with her staying in a boarding house that was all noise throughout the day and night, but she’d finally found a small furnished studio apartment in the middle of Brooklyn just off of Gates Avenue that would rent to an unmarried woman, for only $15 a month. Even if the Commandant hadn’t given her a job right off the bell, she’d have had the money from her uncle to shore her up until she found _something_ , and jobs were going begging all over the city because of the war and labour shortages that came along with it. Still, the Commandant had been kind even, kinder than she would’ve thought, and had been truly sad to hear the news of her uncle and his friend’s death.

She was lost in her thoughts of getting back to her small place and curling up under the quilt the landlady had loaned her (linens hadn’t come with the rental but that wouldn’t matter soon enough when she had a bit of cash in her pocket to pretty up her new abode), when she heard a manful yelp. Something small and silver rolled by her foot, startling her more than the yelp had. It was a subway token, and it hit the edge of the curb, arced through the air, and dropped right down the sewer grate. She heard the light _plip_ it made as it hit the water. Only then did she think to move, peering down after it.

“Dammit!” An annoyed male voice cut through her slightly depressed reverie, and she looked up. A man in his mid-twenties was huffing up to her, his faded brown checkered shirt unbuttoned at the collar and plastered to a well-defined chest that would’ve made Lydie, her best friend back home, swoon. Even scowling, he was an attractive hard-boiled man, and his glare was more focused on the drain grate than her. She felt a light pink flush spread across her cheeks and she tried to stand a little straighter, grateful that it’d been warm enough that she hadn’t even needed a coat with the sleeves of her dress coming down to her elbows and the trim cut of the whole dress hugging in at her waist. She was no new foal when it came to men, but being a _girl_ in the country had made her want to be a _lady_ in the city.

“You lose something?” she asked, taking note of the slight tousle to his otherwise neatly arranged hair, and how his suspenders fit over his shoulders. He had a coat strewn over one arm that was dusty at the elbows, matching the dirt on his knees and at the hem of his heavy twill trousers. A worker then, given the scrapes on his hands and the exposed skin of his forearms where his sleeves were rolled up to the elbows, maybe even from the Navy Yard. He sighed and then looked at her for a second, glancing back down at the grate, and then tilting his head to take her in fully.

“That was my last token,” he said, although he sounded distracted as he spoke the words, and he automatically lifted his hand to his head, fingers brushing through the stray strands that were stuck at angles to settle them. It seemed that the new dress she’d picked up at the seamstress’s the day before was a winner, given the appreciative look he was giving her figure, although she would’ve liked it better if he’d spent less time glancing down her frame and more time looking her in the face. “I don’t suppose you realized that when it bounced past you, huh sweetheart? That’s alright though, I’ll forgive you if you let me take you out Friday.”

Her lips parted in shock. She’d only be in the city less than ten days, but already she’d found that men in the city moved a damn sight faster than they had at home. There was a definite blush in her cheeks now, tingling on the apples of them, as he stood in front of her and fingered the line of one of his suspenders. He had a warm grin on his face, sly like he knew her secrets, and it flared a heat in her that wasn’t quite interest and a little more like embarrassed irritation.

“Maybe if you hadn’t been such a butter hands in the first place, you wouldn’t be stuck asking a lady out when you just as sure said that was your last token.” It felt good to hit back at him, and he looked stunned for a moment before his grin reappeared, smugger than ever. He stepped into her space, and she had to tilt her head to look up at him, over six feet if he was an inch.

“Don’t be like that doll, Friday’s pay day and I’ll take you out to the prettiest dance hall you can find in Brooklyn. I’ll happily walk to work a full week if I can spend an evening with you and those pretty brown curls. Spend some time on my arm and it’ll more than make up for you losing my token,” he finished with a wink, holding his hand out to her and she exhaled in a short, annoyed gasp. She took a step back as the street car’s bell called out from down the way, and yanked open her sensible brown leather purse, fumbling for the coin wallet she kept there. Out of it she fished an extra token, and slapped it into his open palm. His face clouded over as he looked down to see the circle of silver sitting on his work-roughened skin.

The street car pulled up, and the doors cranked open. She breezed past him and stepped up, depositing her token into the dish for the driver.

“I don’t date drugstore cowboys,” she said over her shoulder, and grabbed a seat near the front just in case he decided to be a bother. She’d learnt that particular lesson quickly. He followed after her, ducking under the handle bars that ran the length of the car for standing passengers to hang onto.

“What about real cowboys, then?” He asked, with a nod to her boots, bought back home and not in the big city. They were sturdy but not quite in the fashion of the locals. She rolled her eyes and looked out the window as the street car trundled down the road.

“Leave her alone, son,” the driver said, eyeing them both over his shoulder as they rattled through the streets of Brooklyn. She could feel the young man’s stare on her despite the driver’s warning, hot on her skin like a mark. It was blatant, but non-threatening in the way she knew he was more showing his interest and less his disrespect. She didn’t know how she knew, but she did, as sure as she knew when certain men were _trouble_. This man wasn’t, just a little overeager in an earnest manner. Twenty minutes later of her looking at him out the corner of her eye (he’d relaxed some and sat down, hands slung over his spread thighs as he slumped in his seat), the street car bundled onto her road.

“Gates, please, sir,” she said to the driver, standing up a moment too soon as the car came to an abrupt and shuddering slow down. She nearly lost her balance, but her would-be-suitor was on his feet in a split and had grabbed her around the waist, one broad hand spanning warmly over her stomach. He caught her fast against him, pulling her back into his chest so she wouldn’t tumble.

“Whoa there, try not to crash this jalopy while we’re still on it,” he called to the driver, letting her settle her weight back until she was upright. Her heart skittered for a moment when he held onto her for an extra second too long after the car had stopped completely. The driver just threw up his hands and pointed at her unexpected saviour.

“Alright wise guy, off, but you leave that lady alone or I’ll report you to the transit inspector,” the driver said. “You can catch the next car for your comment.”

Darcy pushed away from the man behind her with a muttered thank you, a little embarrassed at having needing his help, and walked with as much dignity she could muster down the steps to the street.

“S’alright, it’s my stop anyway,” she heard the cheeky response from the young workman, and he hopped down beside her, falling into step with her. She inwardly groaned as the street car rumbled away, leaving them to wave off the dust it kicked up. “I meant that too, honest, this is my stop,” he said after a moment. She didn’t reply, just continued walking, and he kept his distance, leaving several proper feet between them as they moved down the sidewalk. “It’s the least I can do, to see you home and to your family’s care since you nearly hurt yourself because of that crazy driver.”

She held back the snort she really wanted to let loose. He slung his jacket over one shoulder, his long legs easily striding alongside hers, although she noted he shortened his step a little so she wouldn’t have to rush to keep up. Not that she would have rushed, not for him and the upper arms that filled out the sleeves of his shirt _just so_. Her building was within sight at last and she sighed, quickening her pace just a slight bit, but she definitely was not walking faster to match speed with his.

“You’re not even gonna give me your name? You’re a cold miss, but I like it. It’s charming, like that pretty dress you’re wearing, and that nice hat. You look too good for that neighbourhood I found you in.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and seemed to stride along with even more ease, which annoyed her to no end. She considered herself a friendly girl, and certainly she’d never had a problem making friends in her old town when she’d moved there after her mother had passed. She had trouble shooting back words at him though, something about the man made her nervous in a fluttery way and tied her tongue up.

“A common man asks a woman her name first. A gentleman offers his first,” she said after they walked another block. He chuffed out a half-laugh and then stepped in front of her, stopping her short. She glared up at him through the fading, limp roll of her hair that was falling down her forehead under the cream wool edge of her hat. He offered her his hand, palm up, and motioned for her to give him hers. She sighed  and would have refused, but he tilted his head to side and looked pleadingly adorable, so she gave in and placed her palm on his. He half-bowed over it, a wide grin on his face.

“James Barnes, but friends and pretty girls call me Bucky,” he said, most charmingly. She had to bite the inside of her lip to keep from answering his smile with one of her own.

“It’s been… well, something to meet you anyway, Mister Barnes,” she paused and he raised an eyebrow, clearly waiting on her and not discouraged by her formality. “Darcy Lewis.”

“It’s my pleasure, Miss Lewis,” he said politely. She moved to pull her hand away, but he curled his finger around the tips of hers, and bent down to plant a soft, warm kiss on the back of her hand before stepping out of slapping range with a cheeky wink. He was… hilariously incorrigible, and looked so pleased with himself that she couldn’t help but let a small smile warm her face. She didn’t take his arm when he offered it though, and ignored his sigh when he dropped it back to his side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I appreciate all comments! It helps me write faster and inspires me. <3


	2. Where Angels Fear To Tread

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Darcy starts her new job at the Navy Yard, and realizes life's too short to wait on happiness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title of this story is taken from the lyrics of [Handful of Stars](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EtZCM_CsrE) by the Glenn Miller Orchestra. There's nothing like listening to some old timey music while reading pre-serum Steve and Bucky fic! So enjoy the tune while you read. :)
> 
> The title of this chapter is from another Glenn Miller Orchestera tune, Fools Rush In (Where Angels Fear To Tread).
> 
> I'm having a good lot of fun researching period information like how much things costs, places, what the tenenaments looked like, and what the working conditions were like. There's a funny article from 1943 on hiring women in the workplace, advocating married women over single women (less likely to flirt, more likely to be serious), and husky women over thin (more likely to be calm and even tempered than their "skinny sisters").
> 
> I am also perversely enjoying writing in a lot of flirtatious behavior and outright sexism, which you can expect to see in subsequent chapters as Darcy navigates Life In The Big City.
> 
> Hope you love it as much as I've loved writing it!!!

True to his word, Bucky had walked her to her building, catching her hand in his and giving it a gentle squeeze before letting her go running up the steps to the front door. She hadn’t known exactly how she felt about it, being so actively pursued by someone, and as she let herself into the building she’d paused, watching him sling his hands into his pockets and walk out of view.

“You’ll want to watch yourself around that one,” her landlady stood behind her wearing a slightly mussed dress and apron, smutched with flour from a day of baking. One of her many children was clinging to her legs, limpet-brown eyes staring up at Darcy from where the little girl had her arms wrapped around her mother’s dress. Darcy liked Mrs. DeRoche well enough, she was kind, and had many words of good advice since Darcy had moved in.

“Oh? James? He- oh no, ma’am, it’s nothing, he was just walking me home.” Darcy smiled weakly, pulled her key out on the string she kept tied around her neck, and went to unlock her door. Mrs. DeRoche leaned in her own doorway, across the hall from Darcy’s, and smiled warmly, shooing her little girl back into the apartment.

“He ask you out dancing? Mr. Barnes is said to be quite the dancer. More than one young lady around here has fallen for that pretty face of his. You’re a sensible girl though, Miss Lewis, but mind what I said about him… he’ll have you on your back with his hands up your skirt before you’d notice.” Darcy looked up and searched the woman’s face for any hint of malice, but only found kindness and some concern there. She turned the key in her lock and opened the door.

“My mother didn’t raise me that way, although I’ll thank you for the reminder. He seems nice enough, but I’m not looking to hitch my car to anyone’s tram right now. I got the job today, by the way, so this weekend I’m gonna go out and find myself some linens so you can have yours back.” She dropped her key back under the neckline of her dress and Mrs. DeRoche just nodded before turning back to her own household.

“No rush on that, Miss Lewis, no rush at all. And I’m glad to hear… a nice girl like you doesn’t need to be caught in a bad situation with a man who’s as like to take off at the hint of trouble, if you get my meaning.” With that, she gave Darcy a nod, and closed her front door. Darcy sighed and tried to wipe the mental image of James- _Bucky_ , leaning over her with that wicked smirk on his face, and the warm spread of his palm on the outside of her thigh, feeling a light flush come over her face. No, Mrs. DeRoche was right. Darcy was in no position to be taking up with men, and acting as if the consequences of that didn’t happen to girls all the time. Her mother had hammered it into her, and her uncle as well after her parents had gone. There’d been a frank discussion about the wickedness of men in general, with him. Since he’d never married, she trusted his judgement as he saw the worst of them working at the factory being a single man, where other men felt they could speak frankly to him.

As she changed out of her good clothes and slipped into a simpler dress, good enough to go to the shops but not so good she couldn’t get it a bit messy with cooking dinner and doing a light clean, she put James- _Bucky_ -Barnes out of her head, and focused on what she’d need to prepare for when her work started the next week.

~*~

The weekend passed without running into Mr. Barnes again, and she’d kept her promise to Mrs. DeRoche. She’d replaced all of the linens that she’d been leant, spending carefully out of the store of coins she kept under her mattress. The bulk of her savings she had at a bank a few streets over from her house, but she was of the mind it was smart to keep a little stashed away at the apartment so she wouldn’t have to be forever trotting up Gate Avenue. Her little one-room studio looked a lot fresher by the time Sunday morning arrived, and she was able to dress in her nicest to go to church before working on knitting up a new pair of warm socks for the winter that felt like it was looming over her shoulder despite it being the early spring.

Darcy hated the cold, and had worn through the last of her woollen socks in the snows of Maryland before moving. She’d even splurged and treated herself to a little wireless radio that had cost an exorbitant $19.65, but it had been worth it to be able to listen to Glenn Miller and his Orchestra while knitting in the Sunday twilight. Her bed was right under one of the four windows she had, and it looked out onto a alley-courtyard shared with the building next door, where there were a few vegetable patches, and loads of laundry lines running between the buildings all the way up as far as she could see. It’d been nice to see the new-cleaned linens and clothing fluttering in the breeze while the sky darkened, her stomach full of a simple chicken dinner she’d put together for herself.

Monday morning dawned fresh and bright, and with a packed lunch with dinner’s leftovers in her bag and a sense of butterfly-excitement in her stomach, she made her way over to the Navy Yard. Her first day at work had been a tremendous overload of information, learning the different levels of naval officers that staffed the yard, as well as their laymen helpers. She’d taken lunch on her own, because (and she wasn’t sure how she hadn’t noticed when she’d gone in for her interview), she was the only woman at the Yard other than the Commandant’s secretary who took lunch with him, and wasn’t quite sure how to talk to all the men with their relaxed jokes together that went quiet whenever she came around. The Commandant had been so kind, and had set her up at her own desk near the entrance of his office, close enough to be within sightline of his secretary, but far enough that she was still tucked into a corner. She’d be reviewing timesheets for the men who worked in the Yard at first, as the Commandant wanted a full report on how their hours were being spent so he could suggest much-needed wartime efficiencies. To say the Commandant was a little enamoured with efficiencies was perhaps an understatement.

“Efficiencies, Miss Lewis, are all around us. Your father was rather adept at finding efficiencies, and it was an honor to serve beside him in battle. Your uncle’s letter said you were a sharp young thing, and I have no doubt that you too, will be clever at finding areas we can tighten up the ship’s lines,” he’d said as he stood at the far end of his office, looking out the windows that offered a view of the work yard.

And so her first and second days had been spent, pouring over paperwork and pulling out figures onto long tally-sheets for the Commandant to review upon the completion of her project. Her third day started much the same, and by then it was feeling right to go home after a good day of work, make dinner and fall asleep knitting on her socks only to get up and head out to bury herself to the elbow in paperwork. By the time lunch came around, she’d been nearly cross-eyed from staring at tiny numbers and her fingers were marked up with streaks of graphite from her pencil. With a huff, she sat up straight and stretched her back, standing with a low moan.

Across the room, Betsy, the Commandant’s secretary, shot her a smile. The older woman had been more than kind to Darcy, something that she was grateful for as it wasn’t always easy for a woman of years to accept a bright young thing into the thick of work (or so her mother had told her). There were sometimes issues of jealousy between women at the workplace and Darcy’d been nervous of that, but Betsy had been nothing but polite and unfailingly helpful.

“Going to lunch, dear? It’s a nice enough day, why don’t you go down to the courtyard and get some sun, work on that tan a bit. Men do love a healthy complexion on a girl,” Betsy said with a playful wink that would have been out of keeping for a married woman in her forties, but she had such a cheerfully young face that it suited her anyway. Darcy felt her cheeks pinking, and grabbed her bag lunch.

“That sounds like a swell idea, Betsy,” she said, tucking her lunch up under her arm and making her way to the stairs and outside to the yard itself. There was a few benches dragged out to one side, far away from the activity and labor that took place at the dry dock closest to the Commandant’s office building. She found herself a prime perch and watched the men at work building a new ship for the war effort. It was amazing, to see them scale up and down the side of the boat on systems made up of no more than pulley ropes and boards. She tucked into her lunch with enthusiasm, the sun beating down her head and shoulders to warm her from the outside-in. She’d not bothered to bring her hat along and it was nice to feel the heat soaking through her thick curls. There was a high whistle, and she looked up to see one of the men, clinging to the side of the boat like a barnacle, waving at her and giving a hoot.

“Hey down there, sugar,” he called, and he was so high up he was merely a blotchy smear of a person. She squinted to see him properly, and put a hand above her eyes to shade them. “You rationed there, baby girl?”

_Oh_ . She blinked and dropped her hand from her eyebrows, cheeks burning bright red as a few of the men working turned to look at the fool of a man calling out to a young slip of a thing eating her lunch. Never back in Maryland had the male attention been so pervasive, although she’d had her fair share of carping looks and teasing words thrown her way in school and on her way to her little Friday office job. But Brooklyn was a thing altogether different.

“Get back to work, you lazy sod,” called another workman in a thick Scottish burr, and she looked up again at her vocal admirer as he waved a hand at the other man in derision.

“You’re just jealous I saw her first, McCallum!” he yelled back, and then shifted to look at her again, a wild grin on his face she could just make out. Her cheeks were burning red, and she hurriedly grabbed what was left of her lunch and packed it back in its bag, knowing she’d never be able to finish it in comfort now. Not with some loudmouth flat-tire making a fool of himself over her. She wanted more than anything to be taken seriously by the Commandant, and how could she do that when men were so willing to shirk their work just to chat her up?

She hadn’t taken more than a step past the end of the bench when she heard a horrific shriek which stopped her in her tracks. Darcy’s head flew up and her mouth dropped in horror as the slacking workman hung by one hand from the end of his board and rope contraption- he’d obviously leaned too far out in to holler at her, and gotten himself off-balance for his trouble.

He cried out again, and there was a chorus of yells from the workmen around him and down on the ground as they pointed and shouted for someone to throw a line down to him, anyone,  _anyone_ . It was too late though, and with a terrified cry, the man dropped, ten, twenty, thirty, forty feet, further-

Darcy whimpered and turned her head, shielding her eyes with her free hand as the sickening thud, like something wet hitting something very solid, echoed out in the yard. The sounds of tools being dropped, and the shouts of men converging on the downed accident victim buzzed in her ear and then faded off as she stood there, unable to move, or breathe deeply. Minutes passed like hours. Finally a pair of warm, gentle hands grasped her shoulders, and she looked up into Commandant Breville’s kind, if worried, face.

~*~

She was sent home, with strict orders to take the next day off,  _with pay_ , for having witnessed such an atrocity. Never mind that she’d seen a work-hand get trampled by a thresher five years gone, she was still in shock at how quickly a vibrant young life had been taken… and even if the man had been goofing off, making eyes at a lady when he should’ve been working, death was a little too stiff of a penalty for her.

Numbly, she rode the streetcar, and only got up at the urging of the driver that day, who seemed concerned at her blank expression and stiff limbs. She wasn’t sure how she walked the few blocks to her apartment building, and she stood for a long moment, staring up at the tall building, trying to count how many storeys the man had fallen… ten… twenty… thirty…

“Miss?” A young man, slender, blond, stood a few feet from her. She blinked her dry eyes, scratchy and vision bleary from staring at the apartment for so long. Her gaze flicked to his full lower lip and then up to his eyes, so _blue_ and clear, set in a fine-boned face and rimmed with thick lashes more fitting on a poetic artist from the century before than a young man in a country at war.

“Hmm,” she responded eloquently. He cleared his throat and shifted, his clothes a little too loose on a frame that was just a little too thin. The war was taking it’s toll everywhere. He wasn’t the tallest of men either, probably only topped her by an inch or so. She continued to take him in, every bit of him, and her throat closed up at the thought that she and he would continue to wake up to a sunrise tomorrow, but the man at the Yard would not.

“Are you alright? Miss? You look lost. Can I help you find where you’re going?” He stepped towards her, non-threatening in every line of his body, and all she could think was she’d spent so long hiding from love after it tore her mother apart when her father’d died. She didn’t want to waste another minute of her own life holding chance at bay with the door closed firmly to a future love. The young man stepped in again, only an arm’s distance from her, and her heart pulsed as he reached to take her hand gently between his palms. “Miss?”

Darcy exhaled a breath and blinked before she threw herself at him, wrapping her arm around his neck. She pressed up into his thin chest, her mouth finding his. He startled, grabbing onto her, his hand curving around her waist as her lips warmed his, and his eyes were wide in his face. They stayed like that for a heartbeat, then two, and he pulled back when he’d finally gotten over the shock of it. It was then she noticed his hand on her was trembling, fingers pulsing and flexing into her through the thin wool of her sturdy gray work shift.

“I’m so sorry,” she said suddenly, eyes flickering over his face, almost as shocked by her behavior as he clearly was. His tongue flicked out over his lower lip, and she saw some her rouge had rubbed off on it. Lord, she was a _hussy_ , no better than she ought to be, throwing herself at strange young men and kissing them unasked only days after turning down dates and whistles from other equally strange young men. Still, she clung to him, the scent of paper thick around him. He smelled of paper, soap, spearmint; it cleared her head from the fuzzy-wool feel that had surrounded her since the accident.

“No, no I’m sorry,” he apologized quickly, although for what he was sorry for confused Darcy, and given his expression, it was also a mystery to him as well. She swallowed hard, and moved back. He instantly dropped his grip on her, letting her go, giving her space to pull away if she wanted.

“I’m Darcy,” she said, “and I’ve had a bit of a bad day.” That was an understatement, but it would work as an explanation for her rash behaviour. He nodded, once, sharp and short.

“Steven Rogers, but um, please call me Steve. Are you sure I can’t help? You’re not lost, are you?” He passed her the remains of her bagged lunch she’d had gripped in her hand on the way home. Clearly he’d grabbed it when she’d thrown herself at him. _Lord above_ , she thought, a new flush walking across her face.

“I live just here,” she murmured, looking away from him and back at her building. The warmth that had poured over her in the Yard had returned when she’d kissed Steve, and with it came more clarity that continued to pull her out of her haze. “So I’ll just be… going home. Nice to meet you, Steve.” She stepped away, and then again, not looking over her shoulder to see his face. She couldn’t, too embarrassed by herself, and _honestly, Darcy, what were you thinking?!_ She huffed to herself and walked up the stairs. She made it to the top when she paused, still feeling his eyes on her, and she turned.

Sure enough he was watching her, caution and concern on his face, and no small amount of interest in his features as he regarded her. There was a ringing in her ears that sounded a lot like a horrific cry, and she wanted to drown it out, stamp it out-

“D’you wanna go dancing on Friday?” she called out before she could stop herself, and the keening wail in the back of her mind stopped dead, silent. Steve blinked rapidly, in shock, before he cleared his throat, looking around him as if to ask _who, me?_ She nodded in encouragement, gesturing to him. Life was too short, she thought, to not take every moment for the last.

“I... uh, I’d like that Darcy,” he said finally, convinced that she was actually speaking to him, and not some other man standing right behind him.

“Pick me up at six,” she replied with a smile that called out an answering one on his face. “I’m in 1D, just come knocking, my windows are the four on the side of the building,” she said, pointing to the corner of it, and didn’t notice the odd sort of guilty flush that spread across his cheeks in the next moment. He nodded again, and she opened the front door of her building.

“See you Friday, at six, 1D.” He looked down the alley that lead to the courtyard with peculiarity, and then back at her with a shy smile. She smiled back and retreated to the cool shadowed hallway, pulling her key out on its string, and resolving to remember more the feel of Steve’s mouth under hers, and less the final noise of a man lost to the world too soon.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> <3 Thank you for all your kind comments so far, my doves. Won't you be a doll and leave me another letting me know what you liked?


	3. Fly In The Milk Bucket

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky questions Darcy's motives where Steve's concerned, and the latter two go out on a date.

When Steve had wandered into their apartment that afternoon, blinking madly like there was something wrong with his eyes and his hands clenching and unclenching, Bucky wondered if his friend was having a fit. He was near ready to race off to call the doctor for Steve for a long minute. Then the poor fool had sat down on the couch and told him that a pretty girl had gone and kissed him without warning, then asked him out on a date. No offense to his best friend, but he was certain Steve was having a fit then, or at least had been maybe robbed by an opportunistic migrant girl. It wasn’t until that Steve had managed to get out that it was a pretty girl named Darcy from the building next door that Bucky finally begrudgingly believed him that it’d actually happened, and not been some sort of trick or mugging.

Still, it nagged at him like a stone in his shoe. It was just that Steve didn’t exactly have the kind of, well, attributes, that inspired a girl to put her lips on him without a bit of prodding. Also, Darcy had been pretty adamant about turning down Bucky’s every effort to ask her out when he’d walked her home. He felt guilty questioning it at all, and he was happy enough for Steve, regardless. It just wasn’t regular for Bucky to be passed over by a girl for Steve, and from the expression on Steve’s face he quite clearly couldn’t believe it when Bucky said that Darcy-next-door was the girl who’d turned him down just days prior. That had boosted Steve’s spirits a bit, but then he’d crumpled again.

It took a half a glass of whiskey before Steve’s reason for his miserable, guilty hang-dog face came to the surface. It turned out that pretty, pert, little Darcy-next-door was also the girl they’d had a birds-eye view of for the past few weeks, the new one who’d moved into the bottom floor apartment across the way. The girl who’s curtains didn’t go all the way to the top of the window, and left a good ten inches of glass, a fact she clearly hadn’t paid enough attention to when she’d been moving around her apartment at night right down in her delicates. They’d both taken to leaning against the frame of their window in the evening hours to catch a glimpse of her long, let-down curls, and the petal-pink of her underthings against her creamy skin. At least Steve had the excuse of drawing, his sketchbook his hands, even if his pencil rarely touched the page.

“Well I’ll be,” Bucky had finally drawled out, and shot a glance at the window, wondering if he should go look, see if she was getting down to the bare minimum again even though it was early still. Steve’d read his mind and shot out a hand to grab his wrist, with a stern expression full of don’t you dare James Buchanan Barnes. So Bucky’d left it and made dinner instead, and neither of them talked about their questionable morals of spying on unnamed girls being okay, but peeping on a girl they both knew now? Well. They’d have something to say at confession the following Sunday.

Their secret bad behavior aside, Bucky still couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that something wasn’t quite right in Darcy’s asking Steve out. So he sought her out, the next afternoon. He hadn’t planned on it, but as he came home from work he found her down in the courtyard, hanging up her laundry on a line.

“Hello Miss Lewis,” he greeted her as he sauntered up, “you’re home early, aren’t you?” He let his gaze sink over her for a moment, taking in the tight nip of her waist in a patriotic cherry-red dress that had seen better days as it was patched at the elbow and the hem had been turned up a few times until it wasn’t quite long enough to be appropriate. Not that he minded seeing the pale line of her legs, stocking-free and bare in the warm sun of the afternoon. She looked up a him where she was kneeling in the grass, bent over her basket of whites and squinting in the bright light. A sweeter armful had never kissed Steve Rogers, that he was certain. A sweeter armful had never turned down Bucky Barnes for a date, he was also certain of.

“Mr. Barnes,” she replied, a little cool, and she stood with a huff, hauling a long sheet up and over  the line coming up on her toes to pin it in place. He reached up and pulled the line down for her so she didn’t have to strain so much. She murmured a polite thank you, reminding of him of the way she’d felt against him on the streetcar, warm and sweet in his arm. He mulled over how to say it, how to ask, because he was so rarely tongue-tied when it came to ladies.

“I hear you and my best friend are going out on a date tomorrow night,” he said at last, and she paused at pinning her laundry up, arms falling down by her sides. “Steve Rogers is my roommate,” he elaborated when she didn’t say anything. It was then she turned to look at him properly, face shaded by the sheet so she didn’t have to squint. Her full lips were drawn into a slight frown, and she had the grace to look a little guilty. He pounced on that, knowing that no good came of a girl asking Steve out like that, she was clearly toying with the poor boy’s heart. He opened his mouth to say as much-

“I’m sorry, Mr. Barnes, I didn’t know he was your friend, or I wouldn’t have asked,” her words came out before he could accuse her of anything. “I hope you’re not offended, but I don’t make a habit of accepting dates from strange men in Brooklyn.” His mind tried to add up her actions with Steve with his with her, and he felt his eyebrows pull together in frustration. She turned back to her laundry, but he let the line go and it pinged upwards through the sky just as she was about to pin another sheet up.

“But you make a habit of kissing strange men and then asking them to take you out? That’s a bit forward, don’t you think?” He’d kick himself later for talking to a girl so harshly, especially one he’d met only once before, but in the moment he could only chalk up his rudeness to shock at being treated with reservation, with suspicion. He’d damn well saved her from falling on the tram- and she thought him no better than men who stood on street corners and hollered at any passing woman.

She looked back at him over her shoulder, reaching up to grab the laundry line without his help, and he saw the two spots of anger lit bright on her cheeks.

“I don’t think you’re in any place to tell me what’s forward, Bucky,” she wielded his name like a knife, and he wanted to reel himself in before he crossed any further past the line he’d bumbled into, but couldn’t. His mouth wouldn’t stop moving, and for once his famed reputation as a smooth-talking charmer failed him.

“I think I am in a place. Steve’s my best friend, my very best pal, and I don’t take kindly when a woman thinks she can toy with his heart and let him down hard. He’s had a tough enough go of it without you thinking you can bat your eyelashes at him, lead him along and then let him wallow in his own misery when you’re done. It’ll be me picking up the pieces, so yeah, I’d say I’m damn well in the place to tell you what’s forward, Darcy,” he served back at her, righteous anger roiling in his gut. Something in the cock of her hand on her hip, and the infuriating shocked expression that hovered on her face had him riled up. His chest was full of fire, tight in his shirt, and how their conversation had escalated so quickly, he’d never understand when he looked back on it years later.

But then her lips quirked up, red and full and smiling, like she was happy suddenly, which confused the hell out of him. She let out a long breath, and then with trembling fingers, pinned up her last sheet.

“I appreciate your concern for your friend, Bucky, and I am sorry if you read any ill intention from me towards Steve.” She dusted her hands off and picked up her basket, her shoulders settling under her dress. “Look, we got off on the wrong foot, I was rude to you, and I apologize.” That wasn’t what he’d expected her to say at all. Her gaze slid to the side-door of her building, where a washing tub was lain out on a low table. “Laundry. Do you have any laundry that needs doing?”

“Huh-?” The turn around in her demeanor and her words had him bobbing along behind her mentally, lost. He’d just accused her outright of playing Steve’s heart and she was asking him about his clothes? “I guess?”

“Why don’t you bring me your laundry. I owe you for the token, remember?” She nudged him with her laundry basket, letting it go, and he had to fumble to grab it. “I’ll do your laundry for you, and you can come on over for a cup of tea and see that I’m not all wicked with bad Jezebel intentions.”

“Al-alright,” he stammered, holding onto the basket. She moved away from him and towards the door, when she finally looked over her shoulder at him.

“Bucky, go get your laundry,” she said flatly, and nodded towards his building. “Bring Steve, if you like. My place isn’t a palace, but I can fix you both up something small to eat, and maybe you can learn I’m no harlot, not better than I ought to be.” He swallowed and then nodded, pulling the basket into his stomach and turned. The slam of the building door behind him spurred him into movement. Steve was going to have words with him when he told him what had passed with Darcy… if he understood it. Bucky sure as hell didn’t.

~*~

In the end, Bucky hadn’t returned. Steve had come over an hour later, Bucky’s laundry balled up neatly in her basket, and an apology on his lips for his friend’s terrible behavior. She’d taken the clothes from him, shaking her head and assuring him that there was no harm done. She’d sent him on his way again, with a wave and a gentle squeeze of his hand in hers.  
  
Well, she lied a little. There was definitely harm done, to her pride for starters. She couldn’t remember a time anyone had spoken to her like that, or presumed such crude things about her. Flirt a little back home with the boys at school? Sure, she’d done that, shamelessly as any other girl, and gone out on dates as she’d wanted, a different guy every weekend because there’d been none she’d liked well enough to go steady with. But she’d never broken a heart deliberately, had never lead a young man on purpose. Bucky didn’t even know her, let alone know her well enough to accuse her of such mean behavior. She’d had half a mind to tell him off and shout him right out of the courtyard, but as she was hanging up laundry she thought of a different, more creative way to turn the tables on him.  
  
Even dressed in a workman’s get-up, he’d been well enough turned out the day she’d met him. The afternoon he’d accosted her in the yard, he’d been smartly dressed in a fresh-pressed shirt that only showed wear at the edges of the collar and cuffs, but all his buttons had been tightly sewn on, and his shoes shined. He may have not been an overly monied man, but he clearly cared enough to take pains with his appearance; every hair on his head was in place when he’d decided to brand her a harlot. She supposed if she was going to be verbally abused by a man, at least he’d been an attractive one.  
  
And his looks had been the key to her (slightly, no, very) devious plan. Once she had his things in her possession, she’d set about shortening up all of his pants. Since he’d decided that acting like a child was in his (and by proxy Steve’s) best interests, he could dress like one, in short pants just below the knee. He’d feel much more comfortable being rude to her if he was outfitted like the ten year old he was acting.  
  
‘Doing his laundry’ had taken up the rest of her Thursday afternoon, that and giving herself a good scrub down in the tin tub she’d bought, parting with $5 of her uncle’s money so she wouldn’t have to use the shared bathroom down the hall with the rest of the tenants and could take her time. So it maybe took a bit longer to heat up the water on the stove, but it was worth it when she could curl up and have a good soak to get the Brooklyn grit out of her skin. When she wasn’t bathing, she kept her clean towels and extra home linens in it as well, tucked by the stove.  
  
She set her hair in the evening, and hot-ironed her nicest dress to wear to go out with Steve the next night. It was a pretty thing, crimson red with an open neckline that folded back on black contrast tips, and pretty blackberry buttons up the front placket. Best of all, it had pockets, so she could take along a little wool shawl and that was it. The lower neckline, just one side of daring, was a little too steep for her to wear her key around her neck though, and she’d have to figure out something for that. By the time she’d finished tidying and preparing to return to work the next day, she was so exhausted she could barely turn out the lamp and slip under the covers.

~*~

Returning to work hadn’t been nearly as hard as she thought it would be, and the day passed by before she even realized it. She was in front of the mirror at home, pinning up one final curl, only to hear a hesitant knock at the door. Her heart thrummed a little in her throat, and she ran a nail along the edge of her lip to make sure her rouge hadn’t smeared before going to answer it.

Steve stood there, shoulders back in a dark grey jacket and matching slacks that seemed to set off his eyes. They were bright blue, urgent, and searching her face for any sign of regret. If Bucky’s behavior had been something to go by, Steve didn’t seem to have a lot of luck with ladies. That thought made her heart clench and she was determined that he’d have a good time that night with her.

“Steve,” she breathed out, and then leaned in to give him a quick kiss on the cheek, not caring that it might be too forward since she’d already damn well smacked him one on the mouth. His cheeks pinked up and he held out a trio of daisies for her, fat yellow centers surrounded by creamy white petals. “Oh, that’s so thoughtful, I-“ she looked around for a vase, her stomach doing something quite odd and making it hard to think. Did she even have a vase? She hadn’t even thought to get one, hadn’t thought she’d need one.

“You look beautiful, Darcy,” he said, breaking through her vase-induced panic. She bit her lip and then immediately stopped, not wanting to get red on her teeth.

“You don’t look half-bad yourself, I like the suit,” she said with a wink, and then sighed internally as her gaze alighted on a milk bottle by the edge of the sink. That would do, no cut crystal for her, but a milk bottle was just fine. She’d forgo the penny she’d normally get in return for sending it back with the milkman. She scooped up the daisies and ran the tap, setting the proud blooms on the windowsill by her bed, before turning to him, the full skirt of her dress spinning around her knees in a way that made her feel more luxurious than she ought to. From the expression on Steve’s face, he didn’t mind, and his eyes were glued firmly on her midsection before he flicked up to look at her.

“Shall we,” he asked, holding out his arm, sweetly formal. She put her hand on his forearm, fingers wrapping around the slender muscle there through his suit jacket as she locked up her apartment. Maybe other girls, Bucky’s girls, hadn’t looked twice at a fella like Steve, Darcy thought. He walked her down Gates to the nearest dance hall to them, and she snuggled up close on his arm, enjoying the clean scent of him, and the mild hint of aftershave. She considered herself lucky, because if any of those girls had stopped just a moment to see the way he was looking at them like they’d hung the moon, they’d never have passed him up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really REALLY adore hearing your feedback, so please comment and let me know what you liked! It's helping me get out a chapter a day, and it's so lovely to open up my email and see all your nice thoughts. You lot are amazing!


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